Just Try To Love Me
by Corrupted Seraphim
Summary: A rather tense student body are taken out of the mansion as Essex learns of Remy's failure.
1. Prologue

All characters are the property of Marvel. 

She threw open the long draping curtains to her room and surveyed the mansion grounds below not that there was much visible this early in the morning. Save for a few trees peaking through in the distance, there wasn't anything visible through the fog that blanketed the landscape. She debated opening the window and stepping out but finally decided against it, choosing instead to begin her strict morning routine. 

She sat down primly on the edge of the cushioned seat facing a large dressing table that was dominated by a three faced mirror. Joining her hands on her bare knees, she regarded herself in the mirror, content to simply to search her eyes for a glimpse of her soul. She had begun to wonder if it was somehow tarnished now because of what she sacrificed in order to get where she was, or perhaps in light of what she was going to sacrifice in order to remain there. 

Knowing that such thoughts were not worthy of her, she took an ornate brush from it's place on the dresser and automatically began working it softly through her long silken hair, each stroke precise and practiced from countless hours of doing nothing else. At the edge of her consciousness, she could hear the growing chatter from the others escaping from slumber about the house, their thoughts loud, obvious and transparent, their hidden fears easily discernable in her mind's eye. 

She was one of the premiere psychics in the world, a shining star even among the increasingly growing numbers of mutants that appeared everyday with new and wondrous powers. Her determination and willpower had allowed her to gain mastery of her abilities, allowing her to act as a psychic scalpel or mental sledgehammer depending on what the situation demanded. 

The emergence of her gift a few years ago had naturally terrified her as the thoughts of others shouted out to her, intruded upon her every moment without respite or mercy. She knew she would have descended into madness had it not been for the intervention of an old friend of her father's, who had developed the methods that had allowed her to reign in her gift and to even develop new applications for it. 

Now that which had originally terrified her only thrilled her heart. She felt that there was nothing beyond her reach, no mind she could not touch, no will she could not bend. Her parents, who couldn't possibly understand what she was any more were still only too happy for her to stay with her new benefactor and his growing brood of young mutants. From each of them, he only asked for loyalty or to perform various tasks for him, something that all of them were only to happy to do in gratitude to him. 

And from her he expected most of all. Every day he reminded her that what she accomplish would be of paramount importance for them and all those like them. 

As she switched the motion of the brush to the other side of her head, her free hand sneaked forward by itself, a small flexing of muscle allowing a small key to fall into her palm from where it had been secured to a thin silver bracelet about her wrist. Taking the key she opened a small drawer and removed one of the small few items that was contained within. 

It was a slightly worn polaroid, taken using some kind of long-range telephoto lense. The picture itself was clear enough despite the range, a profile of a boy sitting beneath a tree reading a book. In truth he was a boy no longer but on the cusp of manhood, his athletic frame discernable as he sat captured for eternity engrossed in the ancient tome on his knees . She imagined she could make out a small smile though it was impossible to be sure. She wished she could see his eyes beneath his neat dark hair but a pair of distinct sunglasses hid them from all prying eyes. 

"Scott Summers," she murmured softly, the name sounding akin to music to her. 

She knew everything about him, knew things that he probably didn't know himself. Mundane things like the book he was reading in the photo was his favorite and that he read that same copy every spring without fail. Private things like that the car he drove was bought with money from his parents' will and that was why he treasured it beyond what a boy normally would do such a car, albeit an extremely fast sports model. She knew what classes he had chosen for his final year of school that started later today. She knew everything. 

She placed the brush back on the table in the exact same position she had taken it from. Raising the picture she traced his from with her hand, careful not to let her slender finger touch the image for fear of damaging it. 

She believed that she might love him. 

If any of the others knew this they would have laughed at her, mocked her perhaps. Little Miss Perfect with a schoolgirl crush on the main man's pet project. She found it a little hard to believe herself. Something as ethereal as love could only get in the way of what she had to do but somehow it had crept up on her all the same. 

She felt that he was from the same mold as the romantic heroes he read so avidly about; self sacrificing, fiercely loyal and almost naively noble, how could she not find herself drawn to him. Thinking of him like this brought the slightest hint of a blush to her pale face and she quickly banished the thoughts, welcome and all as they were. 

An alarm went off somewhere in the building and she knew that it was almost time. Soon the others would be up and about and any privacy she might have would be gone. She carefully slipped the photo back in the drawer and locked it once more. Taking a number of plain hair clips she carefully gathered her hair into a bun, ensuring that not one strand was out of place. Her task completed, she rose gracefully from the seat, and walked to her large bed that was seemed almost too big for the room. The outfit that she had selected for the first day of the school year was carefully laid out on top of it, each garment folded neatly next to each other. 

Today she merely had to be presentable and functional which this rather plain outfit was; A light sandy brown skirt that would stop just below her knees, a plain white shirt and a dull gray sweater with nondescript but comfortable shoes. Garbed in these she would blend in amongst the student body, which is all that she wished to accomplish for the time being. Later when she was comfortable and settled in, she would start wearing some of the more interesting choices that her wardrobe contained. 

She slipped out of her robe and dressed silently, her mind mapping out the day. Once finished she returned to the mirror and to double check her appearance. Retrieving a pair of nondescript glasses, She was ready. 

Ready to accomplish the goal that Nathaniel Essex had set out for her. 

She would not fail, she could not. Scott Summers would surrender his heart to her, Emma Frost. 

To be continued.... 


	2. First Days And First Encounters

All characters are the property of Marvel. 

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From his center seat in the back of Scott's car, Evan took a deep breath, almost like he was inhaling a sweet perfume. 

"Smell that my friends...that's the smell of first day chaos," he proclaimed to his rather glum companions. 

How can you be so cheerful? Its the start of the year." Kurt exclaimed from beside him. 

"I take my pleasures where I can." Evan responded, trying not to let anyone's low spirits get him down. 

"Some pleasure," Rogue muttered, not in the least bit happy to be returning to the place where she was considered even more of an outsider then usual. But on the bright side of things at least she had found a kindred spirit in Risty and she guessed she should take some consolation from that. 

Scott who wasn't really paying any heed to their conversation carefully guided the car through the combination of parked cars and groups of students who were catching up on all the gossip that occurred during the summer. 

"This is the worst day of my life," came a small moan from the last passenger in the back. 

"What's up?" Scott asked as he turned in his seat to back the car into a space. 

"The most important day of the school year and I get a zit the size of a tennis ball." 

"You said Sadie Hawkins was the most important day last year," Rogue reminded her, knowing only too well it would irritate her further. 

"Well duh...This is more important for other reasons," Kitty replied testily. 

"You look fine," Scott assured her as he finished parking. 

"Fine? I look so stupid I may as well have dressed up in a pink frilly dress. Its like I've got a whole new head growing out of my face." 

"Yeah, but only a baby's head," Evan stated cheerfully, earning a glare from an enraged Kitty 

"I'm sure that Lance will not mind," Kurt practically whispered. 

"That's it," Kitty snapped, "I'm so going back to the mansion, taking a sick day, maternity leave, I don't care." 

"If a guy loses interest over a zit," Scott observed as he popped the trunk, "he isn't worth the effort in the first place," which sounded to Kitty's ears awfully like Scott was implying that Lance wasn't worth the effort. 

"So you'd still moon over Jean even if her face resembled a burnt pizza?" she retorted angrily, knowing exactly where Scott's Achilles Heel was. 

Scott held his hands up defensively and bit down on his instinctive reaction to deny any untoward feelings about Jean...not that they were untoward as such. However before he got the chance to say anything at all, the familiar sight of Duncan's sleek car pulled up next to his own, Jean seated happily next to her boyfriend. She gave a small happy wave to the group as Duncan looked on, the smug grin on his face saying it all. 

Scott looked from the car to Kitty who had her arms folded and her face set in a "go ahead and prove-me-wrong" manner. Scott simply sighed and walked quickly to the trunk, doing his best to ignore pretty much everybody else. Enjoying her small victory, Kitty pulled a black baseball cap down over the offending blemish and joined the rest of the group in retrieving their bags from the back of the car. 

"What's first on the menu guys?" Evan asked the other two a few moments later as he pulled out his own rather tattered timetable. The three of them had been quickly abandoned by the girls who had gone off to meet their respective friends and classmates. 

"After the assembly...double math with Carlin," groaned Kurt, not relishing the thought of two periods of numbers and angles. He already seemed to be dragging his heels in the hope that he might miss the whole thing. 

"History," Scott answered simply, juggling his bag and timetable in his hands. "You?" he asked when he finally got everything arranged to his satisfaction. 

"English Lit. with Jones," he replied evenly, not entirely sure yet whether English Lit. was a good or a bad thing in so far as how easy a class it was. 

Evan spotted some of the basketball team hanging by the steps and was already racing off towards them when he shouted over his shoulder at Kurt and Scott. "See you at lunch." 

The remaining pair nodded their silent agreement before heading towards the main hall, the place where most of the student body was slowly gravitating. It was customary at the start of every school year for the principle, some members of the senior staff and a representative from the school board to give speeches before the actual classes would begin proper. As a one-year veteran of this ritual, Kurt wanted to make sure that he got a good seat this year so he could snooze in peace. 

"Hurry Scott, all the seats will be taken and well be front and center...again," he urged Scott who was moving along happily at his own pace. Scott just smiled and shook his head slightly, though he still increased his pace nonetheless for his friends benefit. 

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"I'm almost ashamed to say I know her," Donald Pierce informed his housemate Sebastian Shaw as they shadowed another of their housemates, Emma Frost. She was sitting apart from them near the back of the main school hall and seemed to be watching a spot off to the side intently. Both of them knew exactly whom it was that had captured her attention. 

"Why? You don't think she's capable of the task," Shaw asked, his eyes continually scanning through the throng of students in the hall for anyone of note. Shaw was quite a tall young man at just over six foot and he had the look of a linebacker about him. Unusually for someone as young as him, part of his hair was already starting to gray slightly, making him appear older then he actually was. His current companion Pierce was quite similar, a powerful looking kid who had made something of himself due to a sharp mind and indomitable willpower. 

"Her capabilities I do not doubt, it's her motivation that troubles me," Pierce answered. "She seems to have taken this task rather to heart, or at least one particular aspect of it anyway. I still cannot understand why Nathaniel thinks that Summers is so important," Pierce elaborated on a point that had puzzled all of the members of their extended "family". 

"In all the time I have known him, I have yet to witness Essex being wrong about anything. If he says that Summers is important, then no doubt he is. However...I believe I share your misgivings regarding Frost. She more then anyone should know that business and pleasure don't mix. Well just have to continue keeping an eye of her while we go about our other...duties. Speaking of which, have the necessary arrangements been made?" Shaw asked, his voice lowering as the crowd settled down for Principals Kelly's speech. 

"Of course," Pierce replied in equally hushed tones, folding his arms across his chest as the address finally began. 

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After the numerous addresses given by various members of the staff, the students were allowed to settle back down into the all too familiar though natural routine that was as integral a part of school life in Bayville High as the classes or teachers themselves. The same groups claimed the same lunchtime territory, the same cycles of bullying; romance and schoolyard drama played itself out again and again as it had done countless times before. 

For the inhabitants of the Xavier institute, school life was a welcome diversion from their covert extra curricular activities. The normally outgoing Kitty Pryde felt she was being closely scrutinized while 0sequestered in the mansion, now felt confident enough to let Lance Alvers pursue her actively in public, strange and all as it seemed to both of their respective teammates. Kurt too was also busy nurturing his own budding romance with a girl in his class and despite his outgoing nature was agonizing over every little aspect as she was unaware of his unique nature which caused him real anguish and plagued him with doubts. Jean, who seemed to be doing a thousand things at once around the school, effortlessly re-established herself as the undisputed Queen of the School with Duncan her jock king. Evan gravitated towards a similar crowd as naturally excelling on the basketball court gave him a ticket to all the in-crowds major parties. Scott seemed content to toil away diligently while largely shunning the social scene. All the while a melancholic Rogue watched the rest of her friends and teammates with quiet envy. 

School had resumed for two weeks when the first _unusual_ occurrence took place: Jason Wyngarde, a new transfer student was elected onto the student council at the behest of someone in the faculty. A new transfer student wasn't unusual in and of itself. In fact there had been an influx of transfers in the past two years, many of them now staying at Xavier's. What only a few people noticed was that a practical stranger had been placed in one of the highest student positions with no input by anybody in the student body. No protest was made however, nor inquiry made as the truth was that the general student population didn't really care about the student council and so his election passed unchallenged. 

It had been Shaw's idea to put Wyngarde on the council. He believed that it never hurt to have a friendly face in any place of power. Though the council was practically toothless, it still carried a little weight around the place and it couldn't hurt to have some clout on call if need be. So using Jason's talents they _convinced_ a member of the faculty to push him onto the council, something he was only too happy to do. 

There was another benefit to having someone on the council in Shaw's eyes. Jean Grey was also a member, in fact she was the senior student representative. Though Essex had not left any particular instructions regarding any of the other students in Xavier's mansion, he had spent more time discussing her then he had any of the others save Summers during his briefing. To Shaw that meant that he must have some interest in her too though he had net openly divulged it yet. Still, Shaw believed it was preferable to be ahead of the game then lagging behind it. 

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For the people that didn't really know him and that to be fair, was the vast majority of students at Bayville High, Scott Summers was a bit of an enigma. Other then the students who boarded with him at Xavier's mansion he didn't seem all that close to anybody. In fact he came off as being largely indifferent to those around him and pretty much a loner. Normally this would have marked him as a potential target for the more aggressive students but even they acknowledged that Summers was a guy best left alone. Don't bother him or his and you won't have a problem. 

Much of this reputation had stemmed from an infamous incident on the football pitch where he faced off against Duncan Matthews and two of his cronies. Popular opinion had it that this fight was over the popular and pretty Jean Grey who had just begun seeing Matthews much to Scott's displeasure. The truth was a little different, as Matthews had simply been picking on another student, something a passing Summers took exception to. Though the underdog in every sense of the word, Summers faced the three of them down with unnerving calm. The fight could have gone either way by the time the Couch came out and broke it up. To avoid disciplinary hassles for football star Matthews the entire incident was hushed up but from that day on everyone knew that tangling with Summers was not something to be undertaken lightly. 

So it was with a weary sigh that he approached a group of fellow final year students who had cornered one of the newer arrivals to the school and were happily taunting her, going through her bag with sadistic gusto. Everyone else in the corridor saw it too but knew better then to intercede lest the attention of the pack turned on them. 

"Hey guys," Scott stated in an overly friendly manner as he arrived. 

A number of them turned to face him, confident in their numbers. 

"What d'ya want Summers?" one of the smaller ones asked. Summers recognized him from the football team as being unusual nasty especially given his size or maybe it was because of it. 

"I need to get to my locker," he replied evenly, making sure to keep an unconfrontational tone from his voice. 

"Come back later," someone else said. 

"Can't you see were trying to warm up little miss Frosty here," another added, something unsettling in his tone. 

Scott looked at the target of their attentions. He recognized her from one of his classes where she always sat near the back. He could tell she was pretty though she seemed to have gone to some lengths in order to hide it. Her blonde almost silvery white hair was held in a rather severe looking bun while a pair of plain glasses dominated her face. He couldnt tell much else about her as she was wearing a large light grey sweater and white pants that disguised any hint of her figure. What he could tell though was that she easy pickings for a bunch of Neanderthals like these guys. 

"Can't do that guys," he stated as he calmly took his bag from off his shoulder and placed it against the lockers. 

"Boy scout Summers to the rescue," the small one observed, getting a laugh from the others. "What are you going to do; tell us to pick on someone our own size." 

"No," Scott replied. "I'm just going to swing at you just once and miss but Principle Kelly, whose walking down the stairs right now will see it, come over here and detain us all while he interrogates us." 

They all looked back towards the stairs and indeed the dark suited Kelly was walking down towards them, discussing some papers with another member of staff. In what seemed to be an almost instinctual move, they all dispersed in different directions, muttering veiled threats and the like under their breaths. 

Scott watched them all leave before he picked up his bag again, the girl watching him the whole time. 

He noticed this and smiled at her briefly before shrugging slightly and regarding the lockers, "Hey, it turns out this isn't my locker at all." 

"That was very kind of you," she practically whispered. He guessed that she was still a little upset from what had happened. 

"Don't worry about it. Principle Kelly would have stopped then anyway." 

"Still," she continued nore confidently, seemingly unconcerned with that fact, "to do what you did for a complete stranger." 

"Well, we're hardly complete strangers. You're in my..." he searched to put the face in the class. 

"History class," she finished helpfully. 

"Yeah that's right. You sit near the back." 

She blushed slightly, her head bowing coyly. 

"It's easier to hide at the back," she stated, her voice lowering again to practically inauidible levels. 

Scott knew that this was one of those key moments where he could politely make his excuses and withdraw to safety or he could stay and ask the question that meant reaching out and adding another complication to what he considered an already complicated life. He was a mutant, he was responsible for the lives of the teammates, he had a crush on his best friend while possibly being chased by two other girls; both of whom he liked and now he was about to take another one under his wing. But the simple fact was that for someone like Scott there was ever only really one option. 

"And why would you possibly have to hide?" he asked gently. 

Emma Frost looked up into the ruby reflective lenses and saw only her own face staring back at her and she knew right there and then that she had lost. 


	3. 5 Sided Triangle

All characters are the property of Marvel. 

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Dingy was the word he was searching for. This place was dingy. It was small, dark, damp and inhabited by people that barely qualified as human. In many ways it reminded him of one of his early laboratories except for perhaps the torn pool table that stood unused in one badly lit corner and the continual cloud of smoke hung just below the roof. He noted that the man behind the bar seemed capable of only one expression, which seemed to be displeasure and his clientele weren't much better. He hoped that his rather up market appearance wasn't the cause of their discomfort. Despite the suit he wore, it was evident he was a powerfully built man with broad shoulders and large arms. His dark hair was tightly cropped and even in the darkness of the room, his pallid skin was noticeable. 

Unconcerned with the glares he was getting, he took another drink from the beverage in front of him and marveled once again at just how unclean a glass could get. Still, it was the price you paid for getting the right kind of hired help. It was merely a shame that the right kind of help choose to arrange meetings in establishments such as this. 

It was a good twenty minutes before the man he was due to meet arrived. He slid into the bar, practically unnoticed by the rest of the patrons and took a seat opposite. He was a lean athletic looking man with delicate hands and an easy manner. He wore his light brown, almost red hair loose and a pair of dark sunglasses hid his eyes. 

"You Essex?" he asked, his Cajun accent thick with suspicion. 

"That's correct. Would you like a drink of some kind?" Essex asked in a genial manner. 

"From dis place?" He couldn't hide his disgust, "Live longer if I don't." 

Essex merely shrugged. 

"Jean Luc say you have job so we talk business or do I walk?" 

"Of course," Essex began, more then happy to get straight down to brass tacks. "There is an item currently residing in New York that I would like to possess. The owner of said item is aware of its value and thus is naturally disinclined to part with it so I was hoping that you might be able to somehow convince him on my behalf." 

"Dis item...big or small?" 

"Oh...Roughly disk sized," he answered with a small motion of his hand 

"So it's information you takin'. So is dis information on the disk or is dere some hardwiring involved." 

"There will be no need for any _hardwiring_ as you say." 

"What's on da disk?" 

"Does it matter?" Essex answered, the slightest hint of annoyance evident in his calm voice. "There is however an element of danger involved in its retrieval." 

"Dat's okay. As long as da money's good, Remy okay wit' a little danger." 

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"Look gentlemen...it seems that the fair Mrs. Frost has returned in disgrace after failing to get into the blind man's pants," Sebastian commented more to himself then anyone else from where he sat in a large recliner reading a broadsheet newspaper. 

All of her fellow housemates were gathered in the library that doubled as a den of sorts for them when they had nothing more pressing to deal with. A number of large recliners like the one Shaw was seated in were placed in a circle in the center of the room with a large couch near the wall furthest from the window. Save for that windowed side, the remainder of the walls were covered in books covering every known topic known to man. 

Emma pointedly ignored him, her attention solely focused on Jason who was idly passing the time by flicking through a large book. He was aware that she was having one of her _moments_ when she grabbed the tome from his hand and threw it into the wall, creating a large bang that startled Donald who had been dozing on the couch. Jason turned to face the fury with a bored expression. Emma's temper tantrums were not exactly on the endangered species list and they had all been on the receiving end of her ire at one stage or another. 

"What crawled up your skirt?" he asked, not particularly in the mood to deal with her petulance. 

"Obviously not Scott Summers," Sebastian stated wryly, getting a laugh from Pierce. 

"Where did you find those steroid abusing morons. They were ten seconds away from dragging me in the toilets and doing..." she faltered slightly here, her palpable anger and genuine disbelief getting the better of her. 

"Just like how all your dates end eh?" Donald mocked. 

In a one swift move Emma caught up a book from a chair side table and flung it at Donald, who would have got hit squarely in the face had he not got his arms up in time. 

"You bitch," he exclaimed as he jumped to his feet, his forearms screaming out in pain for revenge. 

"All of you, enough!" Shaw exclaimed in that tone of his that brokered no argument. He was conscious that Essex would have all their heads if any harm came to Emma prior to the completion her task. "The boys Jason _asked_ to brutalize you did what they were supposed to. Summers interceded and you got your opening. Mission accomplished. If there's a problem now it's with your handling after they were gone. Is there a problem?" he demanded. 

"I don't answer to you," she replied haughtily. 

"While Essex is away you do," he reminded her. While nothing was ever said on the subject, it was accepted wisdom that he was the defacto leader of the students and he always acted as such even if the others had to be forcibly reminded from time to time. However he could now see the predicament he had placed her in. In private she would reveal everything that happened but to climb down in front of the other two would be a complete lose of face for her. Despite their adversarial natures he decided against tormenting her further. 

"Pull yourself together and we'll discuss this later." Though it sounded like a harsh dismissal, it was in fact an easy way out for her rather then staying for a confrontation where she would lose more then her dignity. A flash of genuine gratitude crossed her face as she stalked passed him, her head held high maintaining that holier then thou look of hers. 

"Stupid whore," Pierce exclaimed as he sat down rubbing his arms, trying to deaden the pain there. 

Shaw spun on him, seeming to grow in stature and taking up all available space between them. 

"You imbecile Pierce...what do you think Essex would have done to you if you had laid a finger on her. He tolerates her mood swings because she's important to his plan but the three of us don't occupy such an exalted position. Keep his unhappy face in mind the next time you think about lashing out at Emma like some love struck child." 

A clearly chastised Pierce sat down again, knowing that there was no refuting that point. Though Essex was always nicer then nice, there was something deeply unsettling about him that chilled them all straight to the soul. Emma didn't see or refused to see this side of him but she unlike the rest of them had not witnessed Essex being less then nice. The results were...messy. 

A temporary calm restored, Jason couldn't help himself and threw some more oil on to a simmering Pierce. 

"Heh, that's right, I remember now. She cut you off at the knees...poor old Donald doesn't float the Frost boat." Jason laughed; it was a shrill and mocking laugh that served to put the others further on edge. 

Seeing there was no sport to be had with Pierce, his laugh subsided and he randomly grabbed another book from the shelf and began scanning through it. Pierce mumbled something under his breath before he panned out again on the couch, his thoughts focusing on revenge and a blonde haired woman as he stared at the beams across the ceiling. Shaw was left to ponder why he suffered such fools and why Essex had them all here in the first place. 

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It was a well known fact that Rogue and Jean Grey weren't exactly what you would call friends. It seemed strange that they weren't at least someway close given that either of them would happily walk through fire for the other while they wore the uniform. But once that X came off, so did any cordial relations they might have. It wasn't that they were at each other's throats or actively disliked each other; they simply had an understanding where they tried to avoid interacting with one another. 

So Jean was more then a little surprised when Rogue joined her in front of the large vanity mirror in the girl's changing room just after a particularly intense evening Danger Room session. Jean had just finished washing her hair when Rogue arrived in silence, removed her gloves and thoroughly washed her bare hands. There was nothing strange in that but for the fact that she did it standing right next to Jean when normally she would have done it at the opposite end of the room. 

"Looks like Taryn might have some competition," Rogue stated simply, breaking the uncomfortable silence that had settled between the two. 

"Oh," Jean replied in an absent manner though she knew her pulse had gone up a notch or two. "For class president?" Jean asked absently. 

Rogue didn't bother rolling her eyes. It was a game the two of them had played from the very beginning. Rogue pretended not to be openly interested in Scott and Jean pretended that she didn't hold any sway over Scott or cared where his romantic interests focused. But rather then come out and say anything regarding the topic, they had invented the handy Taryn shorthand, whereby they could say what they thought but imply that it was Taryn they were talking about. 

"Maybe for the potential class president," Rogue clarified. They couldn't even bring themselves to say his name to each other for fear of lighting a fuse that was ever present between them. 

"Oh," Jean repeated. 

Rogue finished washing her hands and grabbed a towel to leave Jean to stew for a moment, deciding that the least the redhead could do was work a little for the information she so obviously wanted. Rogue wasn't disappointed. 

"Someone on the cheerleading squad?" she asked breezily. 

It was a poor guess but she had once been interrogated after practice by one of the more...forward cheerleaders about Scott as everyone believed Jean was now a reliable and unbiased source, given that she was seeing Duncan. Jean thought that it would be nice and simple if it were one of _them_. Even though he was more then capable of acting typically...male when he wanted to, Scott actually believed the adage that personality counts and would certainly look beyond any cheerleader's bare midriff and tanned legs. 

"No," Rogue responded. "It's that new girl, Grace Frost, you know the quiet blonde one. She sits in the back for biology." It was the only class it seemed that the three of them had in common. 

Jean nodded though her mind was hastily attempting to picture a face that matched the description. 

Rogue continued, "Well, ah got the story from Risty. Seems some of Duncan's buddies were harassing her by her locker when Scott did his Dudley Do-Right thing and marched in and saved the day." 

Jean couldn't help notice that Rogue's frown matched her own. If you asked Scott if he had a hero complex, he'd laugh for ten minutes solid. What he failed to realize however was that he had a deep rooted do-the-right-thing complex that was almost worse. In fact it really irked her how often he tried to help when his help was neither welcome nor wanted. 

"Let me guess, she was oh so thankful for the big macho man coming into save her," she stated, making no effort to hide her scorn in scathing baby girl voice. 

"Ah guess," Rogue answered though she actually found Scott's chivalry kind of...charming. 

"The infatuation won't last," Jean predicted as she grabbed a different towel to begin drying her hair. 

"Why not?" Rogue couldn't help but ask, secretly feeling that Jean wouldn't hear of any relationship of Scott's lasting to a stage where it might be considered serious. 

"Two reasons," Jean replied evenly as she leaned over to throw her hair forward over her shoulders, blocking her face from Rogue's view. "For one; Taryn will pull out all the stops when she finds out to make sure she's the apple of his eye and two; Scott holds things back and that eats away at you after a while. And that's not even getting into the mutant thing." 

Rogue said nothing but could feel her blood rising. _The mutant thing_...That's all it was to Jean; a minor inconvenience. For Rogue, the mutant thing dominated her every waking moment. It was the little things like that which kept and maybe increased the distance between them. Part of her knew that Jean didn't do it intentionally but that almost made it worse. She took it all so much for granted. 

"Have you spoken to her...the new girl I mean?" Jean asked from somewhere behind a wall of red hair. Jean still hoped that she might be an airhead. Things like that made it easier to dislike her. 

"No, she keeps to herself must of the time. Could be a psycho for all I know," Rogue suggested though she knew better. 

Jean said nothing for a moment before she up righted herself creating a cascade of hair, another thing that annoyed Rogue. 

"I don't think Taryn has anything to worry about," Jean decided, which broadly meant that neither of the two of them had anything to worry about. 

Rogue said nothing and replaced her gloves before leaving Jean alone with her thoughts which at this moment were whirling around in a maelstrom. 

She tried to remember when things had gotten so complicated around the mansion. Before it had just been a small happy unit. The Professor, Ororo, Scott and herself with Uncle Logan popping in from time to time to complete the happy family unit. She had hoped it could go on like that forever but then things changed and new faces appeared; first Kurt and Kitty followed soon by Rogue and Evan. More appeared almost every month and now the place was a regular hive of activity. 

She knew though that she couldn't blame any of them though for her current situation with Scott. Was it even a situation? She was well aware that his feelings towards her had blossomed significantly from when they first met. It wasn't really evident in how he acted towards her but plain as the nose on her face in how he acted towards Duncan. 

Taryn, who had been very much a neutral party at the time, had put his behaviour down to jealousy on Scott's part, which Jean naturally dismissed though secretly she hoped it to be true. She despised the fact that the weak and childish part of her found great comfort in the fact she was being fought over by two not unappealing guys. 

She knew that for Duncan it might primarily have been a matter of pride. As the captain of the team and number one athlete surely he deserved the prettiest and most popular girl at school. Though it seemed incredibly vein on her part to think she was that person, it was tough to deny as _stray_ thoughts told her that's what people actually thought about her despite what they might say. That he actually did manage to make them an item said something about his charm and self-belief. She knew that he loved being seen with her at all the parties and enjoyed being the center of the school universe. And for her it was escapism. Why shouldn't she enjoy being the envy of other girls when tomorrow she may have to face Magneto while their greatest worry was homework. 

No life certainly was simplier with Duncan though a growing part of her knew that it wasn't her real life anymore. 

The other side of the original triangle _that didn't exist_, she told herself, was Scott. Life was never easy with Scott. She hated to admit it but he always challenged her, forced her to be honest and at her best all the time. Nothing made her feel lower when he gave her that look that spoke volumes. _I'm disappointed in you. You are so much better then this_.And worse was how he applied those standards of his to every little thing. 

She remembered one evening in particular where she was going to the hottest club in Bayville or at least what amounted to hot in Bayville. She had spent ages preparing so that she would look stunning for Duncan. The doorbell had rung announcing his arrival and she was going to answer it when she met Scott going the opposite way on the stairs. He looked at her once and smiled briefly before moving on but a certain sadness practically radiated off him. Unable to stop herself she brushed off his mind and learnt that he felt she was somehow degrading herself for Duncan. That he could believe that infuriated her, ruined the entire night for her as a matter of fact. When she returned later she fully intended to confront him about his notions when she heard voices by the pool talking about everything and nothing. 

Against her better judgment she remained out of view and listened as Evan, Kurt and Scott talked about the women of the house. She figured that all groups, both male and female had this conversation at one time or another, comparing the merits of the opposite sex with whom they interacted with daily. 

Kurt had kicked it off by expounding on all the girl's beauty; from Ororo's exotic and noble bearing, Kitty's bambi like grace, Rogue's soulful eyes to her own girl-next-door appeal. Well he had been a good deal more descriptive then that but that was the gist of it. The other two had murmured agreement or even added a comment or two of their own with typically boyish glee. 

Unseen, Jean had blushed slightly. She guessed it was only natural that sometimes when they were watching the girls at breakfast or whenever, they were _really_ watching them. That's what boys did...and girls too though a lot more discreetly. 

But what she stuck with her was what Scott said after the trio had been silent for a while. 

"_You know what's even better then all of that?_" he asked, like being attractive didn't matter in the slightest. His voice had a far away quality as he continued, "_It's their spirit, ya know? It's so reassuring and...inspiring to know that when we do...the stuff we do, you can count on the fact that standing right by your side, sharing all the good and the bad with you will be these amazing women. It's the best feeling in the world_," He stated without shame or hesitation. 

Even as the other two audibly agreed, Jean could practically feel herself glowing. It was then she felt she knew why Scott would have been so disappointed in her earlier that evening. It wasn't that she had worn practically nothing which again was probably the true but it was because she had done it for the wrong reasons. That somehow she had diminished her character by doing it so that Duncan would get a thrill from letting everyone see that he had the prettiest girl in Bayville on his arm. All of them may have been living the lie but she was enjoying it. 

That evening coupled with Rogue's arrival had signalled the start of her problems. It was hard to see someone take such a shine to Scott just as she herself started to see him in a different light. Taryn's strongarm tactics in going after him only crystalized what she felt. So to remain somewhat sane, she bottled those feelings up as best she could and carried on living the fantasy she had created with Duncan. After all what choice did she have. 

"Hey J," Kitty's greeting startled her from her thoughts. She realized with a start that she had been standing there for a good ten minutes staring at the mirror. 

"Hi Kitty," she replied weakly as she pondered just what another female would do to an already fragil romantic situation. 


	4. No One That Dull

All characters are the property of Marvel. 

======================================

  
  


This was the moment Scott had dreaded for the past twenty-four hours. Despite its large size, Bayville High was still a very insular place resembling a small village when it came to gossip in that practically everything interesting that happened was around the school in a very short space of time. As far as he could tell, the news regarding his _rescue_ of the new girl got around in record time and he knew that because of this, sooner or later he'd have to explain himself to Taryn, who for some reason would definitely feel she deserved some kind of an explanation. 

His apparently romantic relationship with her was one that had taken him totally by surprise in that he didn't know he had one until Evan mentioned how cozy the two of them seemed to him. Afterwards he had put the pieces together and realized that someone like Evan who didn't all the details could easily come to that conclusion. However it soon became apparent that Evan was not in the minority...not by a long shot. Every time he tried to _fix_ the misunderstanding with Taryn, she'd somehow hijack the conversation and he'd be worse off then when he started so he just let things be. Let her and everyone else thing what they liked, he knew the truth. 

What amazed him even more was that he actually liked Taryn. She was funny, outgoing and smart; things he put great stock in. However there was a little voice inside him that informed him that felt he was really just a pawn in some larger game that was going on between Jean and Taryn as let's be honest, who could really like the little blind orphan boy. For many reasons, he tried to silence that particular voice. 

He was absently reading one of Rogue's trashy magazines during the lunch break when the big wave finally came ashore. When a shadow loomed over him, he didn't have to look up to know exactly whom it was. 

"Hi Taryn," he stated with what he hoped was enthusiasm. 

She didn't immediately sit which Scott interpreted as a sign that things were not happy and furry in Taryn land. 

"So," she replied evenly, her expression betraying a little disappointment. She was handing him the rope he realized; now all he had to do was hang himself. For a moment her eyes focused on the magazine in his hand and he followed her gaze to the title, _How To Keep Your Man_. He immediately banished the magazine and smiled sheepishly. To be fair to him, all his friends knew that he wasn't a discerning reader and that he'd happily read the back of a cereal box for an hour if it were put in front of him. 

"Listen Taryn, I know you've probably heard about-" 

"Hello Scott," interrupted a new calm voice. 

It was one of those cosmic things that only happened to him and people in sit-coms. You're trying to explain to a girl, who you're not having a relationship with, about another girl, who you are also not having a relationship, when that second girl shows up. 

"Hi Grace," his voice cracked somewhere in the middle of the sentence. 

He turned on his seat to face her. She was wearing something similar to yesterday though today her hair was no longer wrapped up in a tight bun but rather left a little looser in a long ponytail that disappeared behind her back somewhere. She gave him a small smile before turning her attention to Taryn and for a moment there was nothing but silence. 

Scott realized quickly that now was the perfect opportunity to illustrate that everything was above board. First things first and get them talking to each other. 

"Grace this is Taryn...Taryn, Grace," he said by way of introduction. He was aware of how there was a sudden drop in the level of background noise. Taking a casual glance around the cafeteria, he noticed that all visible faces were busy pretending to be not watching or listening to what was going on in his little corner. 

"Wonderful," he thought to himself as he returned his attention to the silent battle of wills going on around the table. 

Like some scene from the old west, Emma and Taryn faced each other down. 

Taryn had subconsciously gone from a slight slouch to bolt upright in order that the taller Frost not be looking down at her, regarded this new threat carefully. And she knew instantly that this one was trouble. Had known it the moment she heard the name Grace Frost and Scott Summers linked in a sentence together. 

Though he seemed completely oblivious to the fact Scott Summers was deemed quite the catch among the female portion of Bayville High. He seened to enjoy sports but was not part of any of the jock gangs, he was smart and clever without any geeky tendencies but Taryn believed that one of the younger girls summed it up best when she said that he was simply hot. It had taken a lot of hard work, patience and a great deal of luck to steal him from under Grey's watchful gaze but she felt it was worth it. She knew there was an element of social climbing involved but to hear her name whispered in the halls like she had once whispered Jean's made any hesitations she felt disappear. 

So when she heard yesterday that Scott had somehow come to the attention of another Amazon, she didn't know whether to laugh or cry. What she did realize though was that she would have to move quickly to head this Frost girl off at the pass. Now that they were finally face to face, she wasn't sure how to proceed. Were Scott on his own, he would have been an easy proposition to manipulate, but now that her potential rival now standing right there, she would have to be a great deal more careful at about how she acted. 

Emma seemed to give Taryn an odd almost appraising look before smiling warmly and reaching across the table, her hand extended in greeting. 

"It's good to meet you, Scott has told me such nice things about you," Emma stated, the smile still etched upon her face. 

Taryn who had subclnciously shuffled a little closer to Scott took her hand and gave it a brisk shake. She had a strong handshake but not so strong as to be considered aggresive. 

"_Nice_," Taryn noted. She kind of hoped that Soctt might have used a stronger word then nice. 

Scott who had sat silently through the whole exchange thought things were going as well as they possibly could. Everyone else who had been listening and watching evidently did too as they started to lose interest now that it looked like there wouldn't be any fireworks. 

"I'm not intruding, am I?" Emma continued, her face the very picture of innocence. 

"Intruding?" Taryn repeated automatically. 

"I take it you're having lunch together," Emma responded. 

"_Of course you are you bitch_" Taryn thought but "No, of course...sit down," came out of her mouth, taking the seat closest to Scott who was beginning to feel very much like the rope in a tug of war. 

======================================

  
  


"I hate to say it but I'm actually starting to feel a little sorry for Summers," Lance practically laughed as he watched the unfolding scene from across the room where he was sitting comfortably with Kitty. She was paying absolutely no attention to what was happening but was rather happily stealing cafeteria standard chips from his plate, which meant they were chips only in the loosest sense of the word. 

She followed his gaze for a moment; her brow furrowing in confusion as she tried to figure our what was going on over in Scott's corner and who it was they were talking to. Intrigued, she stood to investigate when Lance's hand shot out and took hers in his. 

"And where do you think you're going?" he asked in his best teacher-like voice. 

"I was going to go over and see what was going on," she answered truthfully and with full Kitty Pryde enthusiasm. 

"No you are not," Lance stated with surprising determination. 

"Says who," she responded, immediately rising to any challenge. 

"Says someone who just wants to sit next to his girlfriend for lunch because it'll be the whole afternoon until he sees her again," Lance responded with an extra amount of syrup for effect. It worked; Kitty smiled, went all wobbly and took her seat again, a little happy sigh escaping from her. 

"I just wanted to go see who Taryn's friend is," she murmured though all the fight was out of her now. 

"Somehow I don't think they're quite friends…the opposite by the looks of things." 

"What? You mean that…" Kitty wondered as she went back to pilfering Lance's lunch. 

"I reckon so…I gotta tell ya, I don't get it," Lance began as his hand absently took one of the rapidly disappearing chips from his plate, "what is it exactly about Summers that seems to attract women?" 

Kitty punched her chest a few times to help the food go down before answering, "You're…not…doing…so badly yourself," she finally coughed out. 

Lance turned to her wearing one of those patented sly smiles of his. "You know you're right, I seem to be fighting off the girls with a brush these days." 

"Just send any of those girls to me first and I'll set them straight," Kitty playfully pretended to be angry before noticing another couple making their way through the crowded room. "Rogue, Risty...I kept seats for you," she bellowed loud enought for the entire room to hear. 

A rather embarrassed Rogue sauntered over with Risty in tow, each carrying a tray of assorted foods. Though it was far from regular for members of the Brotherhood and X-Men to mingle, Kitty and Lance's growing friendship meant that a truce of sorts had been reached between the two groups. Rogue, as a former brotherhood member, didn't mind hanging out with Lance too much and Risty who was _naturally_ oblivious to the issues between the groups didn't really care whom she sat with so long as they weren't jocks, for whom she had a major aversion it seemed. 

"Well aren't you two the cozy couple," Risty commented as she put her plate down. 

Lance said nothing but turned his attention back to the catfight in the corner, while Kitty blushed ever so slightly before de-railing that particular line of thought. She was still getting used to the idea of being a couple though it was readily apparent she was loving every second of it. 

She gestured over her shoulder, "Lance is getting great mileage out of Three's Company over there…hey, do any of you know who the new girl is?" 

Risty leaned in conspiratorially to Kitty while Rogue watched with Lance though she was careful to listen to what was being said as well. 

"I heard from May, you know May right? No…well anyway, she works part time in admissions and she told me that Blondie's name is Grace Frost and that she's originally from Boston. So I was talking to another friend of mine from Manchester, Brie, who moved to Boston two years ago and she told me that it was in all the gossip columns last year how one of the super rich Frost family was cracking up and that all the Frost kids were sent away to spare them the strain and pain of a family shattering. So putting two and two together we could very well be looking at the richest girl in the room and possibly the building. You got to figure that with a name like Frost she's bound to be a complete pampered stuck-up bitch. A rich bitch if you like," Risty stated, quite pleased with herself. 

"Frost huh?" Lance muttered, though the name meant nothing to him he still sounded somewhat wistful. 

Risty knew that airy tone and immediately jumped on it, "So Lance, as the only male here, what do you make of her? Does the thought of all that money make you go hubba-hubba?" 

Lance turned slowly to face the table, his brain scrambling to come up with an acceptable answer given that he was sitting in a group of girls with his girlfriend. He settled on pretty much a half-truth knowing that it would be easier in the long run. 

"She doesn't do it for me," Lance opened and seeing the approval reflected in three faces he continued, warming to his subject, "She's lucky she's rich 'cause she's kind of nerdy looking." 

"How do you figure that?" Kitty asked, intrigued by Lance's assessment. 

"Well…she's dressed like a librarian, all drab grays and browns. And with those huge glasses, you know she spends all day indoors reading about the latest way to grow plants or knit a weird pattern or something. The only way someone that boring will snare a guy is if she walks around with a bundle of notes in her hand and a board that says _Will pay for friends_. Like finds like I always say and she found Summers, the most boring guy in the school." 

"It's an act," Rogue practically whispered. 

"What's an act?" Risty demanded, intrigued by Rogue's proclamation. 

"All of it," Rogue stated with a wave of her hand. Seeing that this would not satisfy the others, Rogue sighed before explaining herself. 

"The glasses and the boring outfits…it's camouflage, all of it." 

"You seem pretty sure," Lance stated. 

"No one that dull would ever get picked on by the goon squad. No one that dull would make Taryn feel so threatened," she clarified, though she naturally left out the fact that _no one that dull could make me jealous._

"I don't know…it's like I said, it would take someone that dull to be interested in Summers," Lance reiterated, any sympathy for Scott long gone. 

"Can we please change the subject?" Rogue demanded, not at all happy to be speculating on Scott's romantic problems. 

Kitty's face brightened immediately. "Lance and me are thinking of going to the movies tonight, any ideas?" 

_Well this is so much better_ sighed Rogue internally as Risty launched into a number of totally inappropriate suggestions. 

======================================

  
  


"Well Scott and I have been - 

BEEP-BEEP-BEEP. 

Taryn's proclamation on where she and Scott stood was rather rudely interrupted by his cell phone. He looked at the number on the display and immediately rose from the table. 

"If you'll excuse me, I really have to take this," he offered by way of excuse as he left the two of them alone together. A lucky escape in many ways he figured but then again now they could talk about possibly the only thing they had in common which was him. There wasn't much he could about it either way so he concentrated on getting outside for a decent reception. 

The two girls watched him go before turning to face one another again. 

"So how long have you known Scott?" Emma asked almost immediately, knowing that it was better to be on the offensive in the inevitable question and answer session. She had learned of Taryn and her pseudo relationship with Scott early on in her research but she hadn't ever considered her to be other then a minor problem and one easily overcome. If she could push Taryn out of the race on their first meeting, so much the better for her. 

Taryn answered without a moment's thought, "I met him soon after he moved here but he was just another boy back then. I can't say I really got to know him though until Jean arrived and-" 

"Oh Jean!" Emma interrupted excitedly, smiling infectiously as she pushed her glasses further up her face, "I must confess that from the way he spoke about her, I was sure that they were a couple. I felt so foolish when he told me that they were merely good friends and that he wasn't really seeing _anybody_ at the moment." 

It was a lazy effort but she was pleased to see it had the desired effect. Taryn seemed to almost visibly falter slightly, her confidence shaken by Scott's assessment of his own status. Emma knew that Scott's relationship with Jean Grey was Taryn's Achilles heel and so she began to exploit it mercilessly. 

"It's such a shame though…" she began before letting the suggestion hang. 

"What is?" a still slightly stunned Taryn asked. 

Emma leaned across the table and whispered like they had been friends forever rather then potential rivals, "That even though she's going out with that quarterback guy, Scott's still utterly devoted to her," she mimicked Scott rather badly for a moment, "'_Oh she's the winner of this and Jean's so good at that_.' What chance do regular girls like us have against this wonderful Jean Grey?" She finished with a laugh, making it sound like it was just a harmless joke when in reality it was anything but. 

Even though she was attacking Taryn's already tattered belief in her assumption that Scott was somehow hers, she also knew much of what she implied about Jean and Scott was true and that it would be something she would have to overcome herself. She had garnered a great deal of information from him during the time she spent with him after the previous day's incident. Being the noble sort, he naturally wanted to make sure she got home safely and had accompanied her a most of the way. During the stroll, she questioned him various aspects of his life and in his own thoughtful though cautious manner, he had revealed much. He had indeed spoken highly of Grey but not anymore so then he had of the other people who played a major part in his life, including Taryn. Emma felt it was easier though to exaggerate the parts of the conversation that played up Jean at Taryn's expense. 

Taryn mumbled something practically indecipherable about Jean though Emma heard enough to make it out anyway. 

"This is really unfair of me," Emma stated as she placed a friendly hand on Taryn's, "Jean is your best friend and I have the gall to bad-mouth her without even meeting her. If people like you and Scott can speak so highly of her, it's obvious that she's a very special girl…I just can't wait to meet her," it even amazed Emma how enthusiastic she sounded. 

All this unadulterated praise for Jean caused something to bend deep inside Taryn's being. No matter what she did or what she accomplished, it would always fall under the shadow that red-haired bitch cast her over everything and everyone. It had been the same since the very first moment she arrived at Bayville High. She just showed up and somehow managed to charm her way into everyone's hearts. All of a sudden here was the perfect girl next door who was pretty as a picture but could still play sports with the boys. Even someone who had never met her was already singing eulogies about her. This Grace Frost had figured out in half an hour with Scott what had taken Taryn the best part of three years to learn; that against Jean Grey there was nothing a girl like her could possibly do? 

There was only so much bending her spirit could take until there was only one thing left for it to do: snap. 

"You've got it all wrong, Jean and I aren't friends…well we used to be best friends but since she starting going out with Duncan Matthews she's turned into a complete snob. And Scott, well Scott's too nice to say so but you should just see the way she strings him along. I like Scott and all but you've got to wonder does the guy have a backbone at all the way she treats him. I actually feel sorry for the guy because she'll never, ever give someone like him the time of day." 

Taryn knew the moment that Emma leaned back suddenly that she had noticed someone who probably shouldn't have heard what just got said. She turned slowly to find Scott standing behind her, slowly folding his cell phone shut. His shoulders sagged just a little and his mouth was drawn into a resolute thin line. 

"I have to drop Bobby back to the mansion," he informed the two of them, his voice sounding strained, "something to do with his parents. I'll…I'll talk to you later." He gathered his bag and left without another word. 

Taryn just crumpled, the words she wanted to say dying on her lips. Emma said nothing as there was nothing she could say. She didn't particularly feel like consoling the girl anyway as she struck her as being a particularly shallow, angry and jealous little thing. Taryn quickly gathered her bag into her arms and ran from the cafeteria in the opposite direction to the one Scott had gone leaving Emma alone. 

As she carefully removed a packed lunch that Donald had prepared, _reliable puppy Donald_, she thought on how remarkably easy that had been. The girl had been ready for the fall for a while it seemed, all she needed was the push. She was aware of the people still watching her and so she made an effort to look someway embarrassed as she took a delicate bite from an apple when in reality she felt rather elated by the fact that things were progressing so quickly. With Taryn out of the picture it meant that only Jean Grey remained as competition and she would be a challenge that Emma would relish. 

Some of her lunch eaten, she figured that she had remained in the public eye long enough. She quickly gathered up her sparse belongings and exited in a quick though dignified manner. It wasn't long she had done anything wrong after all. 

======================================

  
  


"…and that's where I believe that the disk will be most likely located," Essex finished; pointing to a series of rooms on the large map he had spread open out on a table in one of the rooms of his New York residence. 

Remy examined the map closely, making notes in a small PDA as he did so. 

"So dis is all the security you know 'bout, but dey could be more?" he asked, looking over the map and his notes. 

"I would be very surprised if there wasn't some more _hidden extras_." Essex replied with some relish. 

"Dis a big job," Remy commented. 

"That's why I came to you," Essex stated. "If I may offer my input, I think you'd be best served by going in on a weekday morning as there's less chance of being discovered. 

"No…dis a night job," Remy responded with a shake of his head. 

"Mmmmm," Essex murmured as he considered something silently for a moment before finally speaking up. "So…what remains to be done?" 

"Need to case de grounds first, get a feel for the place. Need to take a dry run, test the fence that sort of thing." Remy replied absently as he took in his more immediate surroundings. 

"You say others live here…where are dey?" Remy wondered aloud. 

"At school," Essex answered bluntly. 

"You don't expect me to go?" Remy asked pointing at himself in disbelief. 

"Of course not. You're here to do work, not to cavort with the locals." 

"Good…Never did like school…too many rules and not enough pretty girls." 

Essex said nothing for a moment as if weighing something up internally. "By going at night you may have to deal with a lot of angry mutant teenagers who will not take kindly to a prowler." 

"Dey never even know I was dere," he responded with trademark confidence. 

"For your sake I hope so…I hope so." Essex replied though he said in it in such a fashion that Remy wasn't sure if he was talking about having to deal with the kids or about dealing with him should he fail. As much as this whole thing stunk in his guts, the money was too good to turn down. Tonight he would try a dry run and see if all the fuss was really worth it. 


	5. What Dreams May Come

All Characters are the property of Marvel. 

========================== 

  
  


It was Friday evening, it was beginning to get dark and that meant only one thing to one occupant of Xavier's Mansion, Rogue was going to have her regular weekly scented bath to unwind. She made very few demands of the other patrons in the mansion but this was one where she put a foot down. On this night every week, she got the second largest bathroom to herself for a few hours to be left in peace. In many ways it was a rather sad indictment of her social life that while many of the others would be considering heading out or at least had the option of going somewhere, the best she could manage was a bath. Though Risty had been straining at the leash in an effort to tempt her out to some party or another, she knew that she'd actually rather the warm soothing water's embrace to a group of sweaty strangers. 

She entered as usual carrying what she considered to be the majority of her _girly_ stuff as the private part of her refused to have any of that on casual display with the others stuff. The shelves in the bathroom were kind of a communal thing and if someone needed something, they wouldn't think anything of borrowing someone else's. Rogue did it herself but these things were personal and…well different. 

As the sun began to dip below the horizon, it bathed the room with enough red light that she didn't need to bother with the lights. Placing the plain black bag on a counter, she removed a number of candles and placed them at regular intervals around the bathtub. The candles were nearly gone and she knew that she'd have to go to that small store that was her little secret before next Friday. 

She started the hot water running before getting some bubble bath and adding a liberal amount, a mushroom of foam quickly forming where the water mixed with it. She reached into a side pouch of the bag and retrieved a number of small bath pearls. They were gaudily colored but from experience, Rogue found that this brand was the most…satisfying. 

Hearing a muffled voice from outside by the garage, she interrupted her ritual to open the one stained glass window slightly to better hear what was going on. Just because a girl wasn't going out didn't mean she couldn't listen in on those that were. Living vicariously was better then not living at all. 

She could now clearly hear Kitty shouting for Scott to hurry up and she knew immediately what all the fuss was about. Lance and Kitty had arranged to go out on a date-date and for some strange reason, Scott had been roped into driving her to the cinema. It would take someone of Kitty's good nature to miss the fact that Scott would rather eat glass then deliver any member of the team to Lance and that Lance would feel uncomfortable for the rest of the night because before leaving, Scott, being Scott, would just have to say something that would annoy Lance. For Kitty's sake, she hoped the two guys would just leave their issues slide for once as Kitty deserved at least one night of happiness. 

A rather beleaguered Scott finally emerged from the mansion hopelessly trying to calm a clearly hyper Kitty. She could understand her excitement. In this very room not an hour and a half ago in a rather unusual display of solidarity, the entire female contingent of the house had given Kitty a complete make over. There had been a lot of discussion (arguing really) about how much effort it should appear she spent on getting ready as she wanted to look good for Lance, but not so good that it would appear she was ready to have his children on the first date. 

They had settled for a happy medium and the important thing was that Kitty was happy, her long hair tied up in an elaborate retro beehive look with enough make-up to suggest she had made the effort but wasn't in any danger of being considered a fire hazard. 

A low guttural growl from outside signaled the imminent departure of Scott's car, the engine idling over reminding her of some big cat. A moment later there was a slight screech as the cat was let off the leash and the car tore down the driveway, with Kitty screaming something about her hair. 

Smiling sadly, Rogue turned her attention back to her bath. 

========================== 

  
  


He had tried standing patiently and when that didn't work, he tried pacing back and forth but that didn't seem to make things any better either. He wanted a smoke, craved one in fact but knew Kitty would smell it off him straight away and wrinkle her nose in the non-cute manner that meant she was annoyed or upset. For tonight, Lance would have to keep from fidgeting the old-fashioned way, through will power alone. 

He couldn't believe he was nervous. He had gone toe to toe with a human Juggernaut, stood at Magneto's side and pissed off Mystique on numerous occasions but somehow the thought of going to the cinema with Kitty seemed to make all of them pale in comparison. 

As other couples disappeared into the cinema, he only grew more anxious, the clothes he bought specifically for tonight seemed to be itching more then they should, the cologne that Pietro gave him stinking more then it probably ought to. 

And if things couldn't get any more embarrassing, who was pulling up but Summers in that fancy car of his. Kitty said something to Scott who nodded but said nothing. She then hopped out of the car and with that uniquely Kitty mix of shyness and enthusiasm made her way towards him. 

For a moment Scott looked over in his direction and Lance thought _here it comes_ but Scott merely gave him the slightest of nods and a small smile before he gunned the engine and dove into the traffic, his car a red blur beneath the streetlights. 

"So," Kitty stated as she finally reached him, one of those deafening silences choosing that moment to descend upon them. 

"I like your hair" "I like your cologne" they both said at the same time, causing them both to laugh and serving to break the palpable tension. Lance wrapped an arm delicately around her shoulder and guided her towards the foyer. 

"Lets go inside and block someone's view with that hair," Lance quipped 

"Lance!" Kitty exclaimed as she jokingly slapped him on the arm. 

As he walked inside with the girl he had chased for months, Lance wondered what he had been nervous about in the first place. Good things do come to those who wait. 

========================== 

  
  


"Who was that particularly dreadful individual in the library?" 

"That would be Mr. LeBeau. He's performing some work for me that demands his delicate and rather unique touch." 

"His delicate and uique touch extended to trying to grope me before dinner." 

"Yes well…I'm sure you conveyed your displeasure to him and he won't try anything like that again in a hurry." 

"No…no he won't." 

"As long as you left him the use of his hands. Now, keep your eyes closed and turn your head slightly to the left, please." 

Emma complied immediately and she felt a feather light touch work its way down from the bridge of her nose. A hand clasped her gently beneath the chin and turned her face the other way. 

"Outstanding," Nathaniel Essex observed, "no tissue damage, no inflammation or scaring. The alteration seems to be taking better then expected." He left her and noted something in chart that he had put down next to her. 

"I can stop wearing the glasses now?" Emma asked, opening her eyes again. 

"Indeed you can. They probably weren't necessary in the first place. You can sit up," he advised as he busied himself with a portable tray of syringes and vials. 

The two of them were alone in a clinically clean medical area where Essex spent most of his time when he was in the mansion. The room was illuminated by a single startling white light that gave the place a very sterile feel that was only accentuated by the equipment that was set up all around the room. Some of it looked absolutely state of the art while other instruments looked positively Victorian. 

Essex was wearing a large white lab coat over the dark business suit he seemed to prefer and his hands were covered in a clear surgeon's gloves. Emma was wearing a simple white patient's gown that was pooled around her waist leaving her upper body exposed. She felt no discomfort however as he been her doctor for a while now and there was nothing she had that he hadn't seen before. 

He casually gave her a hand mirror and she brought it up to her face, carefully examining her nose. It was almost like looking at a stranger's face. Though she knew that only a tiny alteration had been made, she still felt that she may as well have been wearing a mask comprised of someone eles's features. 

"It was necessary," she informed him. "I don't look like me anymore. To the others, the glasses will serve to hide that fact." 

"You're overstating things," he sighed slightly. He had been expecting her to be unhappy, she usually was upset about something in that manner only the previledged can manage. 

"No," she retorted immediately, "when I arrive in school on Monday the thing people will notice about me is that I am no longer wearing glassses, not that my nose had under gone cosmetic alteration." 

"They wouldn't have known anyway," Essex informed her calmly, "and it was not cosmetic alteration. There was no need to crudely cut you open, or any time wasted in uncomfortable reccuperation. The procedure I performed last week works quickly and invisibly but the results speak for themselves if I do say so myself." 

She turned her face this way and that gauging his work further. 

"Cute as a button so to speak," Essex commented wryly as he watched her. 

"Quite," she replied with slight irritation, something that actually amused Essex. If only she knew why he tolerated her attitude. 

"And the rest?" she asked, indicating the rest of her body with an almost disinterested wave of her hand. 

"It's a bigger task. I'll perform it tomorrow morning after breakfast," His confidence in his own abilities was so overpowering that she didn't doubt him for a second. He stopped where he was working to turn and face her as something occured to him. 

"You've made contact with Summers," Essex stated. 

"Yes," she answered simply, placing the mirror by her side on the examining chair where she sat. 

"What do you make of him?" he asked as he leaned against one of the counters, genuinely curious it seemed. It wasn't an emotion Emma saw in Essex often. He always seemed to be ten steps ahead of everyone else so she considered her answer carefully. 

"I can't really see what all the fuss is about," she stated simply. It was a lie. 

"Oh no?" Essex almost chuckled, though if he suspected anything he said nothing. 

Emma returned his gaze evenly, refusing to be caught out. Again she choose to be on the offensive in this verbal debate rather then weather Essex inevitable inquest. 

"What is all the fuss about?" she asked. It wasn't the first time this topic came up but Essex always became uncharacteristically coy when it came to discussing anything about Summers other the same vague notion of his importance to the future. 

He propelled himself from the counter and removed an old black leather bag from a low drawer. It was the kind of bag that doctors used in the past to carry all their equipment when making a house call. He opened it and removed an ancient looking stethoscope. 

Moving around behind Emma, he placed it on her bare back, the cold metal causing her to hiss and jerk forward in the chair. 

"Breath in," he commanded and she immediately complied. As he moved the instrument around her back he started to talk. 

"Do you know much about genetics Emma?" he asked though he knew it was probably a rhetorical question. 

"Not really," she responded between taking gasps. 

"Genetics is life my dear. It shapes everything that we are; from the way we look, react to stimuli, interact with one another to our dreams and ambitions, it's all determined by those little strands of DNA. I have spent my life trying to understand its mysteries, how to manipulate it…create it even. For if one can control the very fabric of creation, there is nothing that lies beyond reach." 

He moved around to face her as he continued his examination and his lecture. 

"One of the fundamental aspects of genetics is inheritance. When two people have a child, the child takes some of the characteristics of both, though usually there are dominant features that always seem to get through. This is true in terms of both the body and the mind. There is naturally some environmental shaping that goes on but a great deal of a person's fundamental nature comes from what their parent's bequeath them genetically." 

"Your family, for example are a perfect example of inheritance in both its consistency and inconsistency. Your brother and sisters are the norm whereas you are not. Your father having dark hair, brown eyes etc has genetic dominance over the blonde hair and blue eyes of your mother yet here you are; a blonde blue-eyed child whose the very image of your mother while the rest of the siblings physically take after your father." 

He stepped away and she pulled the straps of the gown back over her shoulders as he put the stethoscope back in the old bag before returning to his former place by the counter. He took a hypodermic needle and filled it with a green milky liquid that he injected into Emma's proffered arm. 

"But up here," he continued talking as he knocked against the side of his head with a finger," you are very much your father's child. The dry humor, the temper and the keen eye for human weakness are traits that he has passed on to you," he saw the stormy look cross her features and moved quickly to reassure her, "yet still you are not him. I remember meeting you when you could have been barely ten years old and you informed me what you wanted to be when you grew up…do you remember?" 

"A teacher," she whispered. It seemed almost like a lifetime ago. 

"That's right. Even with your father's rather blue blood coursing through your veins you wanted to be something he could never be. A common civil servant," he practically spelt out the words with some of the same distaste her father would manage. She loved her father and he her in his way, but he had always had high hopes for his children despite what they may have wished for themselves. 

Emma was disturbed by all this talk of her family and would have left him right then but for the fact that Essex was being so unusually talkative which meant there was a possibility that he was going to reveal something. 

"What has all this to do with Scott…Summers I mean," she corrected instantly. 

"Everything my dear," Essex responded with a silky smile, having caught her slip though again he said nothing, "now this is the rather stunted version of events." 

"Back at the turn of the last century in…well it's not important where but suffice to say a small enclosed village, an incident took place whereby the entire population of the place was decimated by an outbreak of a new and particularly strain of virus. This rather unique virus had never been witnessed before nor has it been seen since. I say that it's unique because it was one of the first _constructed_ viruses, that these days seem to be the domain of so many doomsday tales." 

"But regarding the village when I day entirely decimated, I erred slightly. There was one sole survivor; a young boy somehow managed to crawl through the fallen bodies of everyone he knew and loved, managed against all odds to stumble the twelve miles to a farmhouse where I imagine he related everything to the shocked people who lived there." 

"The how and the why of his survival is anyone's guess but even a guess is just an uninformed choice. With enough research a wild claim can transform into a concrete fact. With the passing of time, the boy became a man, and went off to fight in a great war that spanned the world. He survived just about and scarred by the experiences, journeyed to America where he could begin anew for the third time. Settling up north, he married a local girl whom he loved dearly. They had a single child, another boy who like his father heard his countries' call when war threatened the world once again. But as opposed to the trenches he fought as a pilot, gaining a reputation for bravery and skill." 

"The war over, he returned home and married his childhood sweetheart and they had three healthy children, two boys and a girl. Through a number of shrewd investments, they grew up in a loving home where money was never an object. When their country rose to face a new enemy, this time the threat being communism, the two boys took up arms like their father and joined the air force. This time however, the duo were not so lucky and only one made it back though. He had been a member of the air cavalry and again like his father, decorated for bravery and such like." 

"He remained with the air force when he returned though the wealth his father had made meant he could have lived comfortably for the rest of his life doing nothing at all, but he took his duty keenly and choose to remain an officer. He met a nurse at the base he was stationed and like any good fairytale they fell in love. She made him choose between the military and her and he predictably set aside his country for love. In the fullness of time, they had two sons. 

He started a private charter flight company that was doing quite nicely before tragedy struck. While flying back to an airport after a family holiday, the plane encountered difficulties. Only the two young boys survived the crash." 

"Through some _technical_ difficulties the two boys become separated. The younger was orphaned off to a family while the other remained in a coma as a result of the crash. When he finally recovered he was shuttled between care centers and homes until finally he come to the attention Charles Xavier who now houses the boy as his own." 

He reached into a bag and withdrew a narrow folder. He looked into it and started withdrawing items and handing them to Emma, who took them curiously. 

"This is a picture of Scott Summers taken with his brother Alex and their natural parents Christopher and Katherine Summers. Scott's grandfather and his family and a rather grainy portrait of his great grandfather, the same person who crawled out of the village so many years ago." 

"How could you possibly know all this?" Emma asked, not believing it all for a moment though the pictures were startling. She could see bits of Scott in all of them. 

"That's not important my dear," he responded with a slight smirk. If only she knew. He took a weight from a nearby desk and held it in the air. 

"If I drop this weight and it hits the floor the energy expended is kinetic and spent, but if I hold onto the weight it keeps it potential, gets even greater if I increase the height above the floor." 

Seeing that he had utterly lost Emma he placed the weight back on the counter and turned to face her, wanting her to understand what he knew to be true. 

"Scott Summers is pure potential. Whatever genetic trait saved his great grandfather was passed down from father to son and has nearly reached its full potential in Scott. Like all his male relatives before him, Scott will be on the frontline of a war that will span the world though this one will not based on some social movement but instead on the composition of an individual's cells. Just like them, he is brave, noble and strong with the added benefit of a mutant power." 

"It is my belief that were he to be coupled with a powerful psychic, their child could very well be the most perfect creature in creation." 

This was all starting to be too much for Emma. For some reason she was starting to feel a little lightheaded. 

"Why not just…take him…by…force," she managed. The room was starting to spin and she couldn't think straight. 

"I don't take him for the same reason I don't permit you to use your abilities around him; Charles Xavier. His ability for mutant detection is troubling to say the least and with that little army he has created for himself, any forceful coercion of Summers will result in swift and probably brutal retaliation. No, Summers has to come willingly and that is why I need you dearest, sweet Emma." 

He lifted up her lolling head and looked into her eyes which glassed over as they tried to focus on his blood red eyes. 

"So pretty," he commented to himself as she finally lost consciousness. He laid her gently down on the chair and carefully removed her top. She was very specific about what she wanted done and it would take him a good deal of the morning to get it all done. "So pretty," he repeated, "but still she's not happy." 

A thought occurred to him, "Why leave to tomorrow what can be done today," he asked the empty room as he went to get his _special_ instruments. 

========================== 

  
  


_"Scott was back,"_, Rogue mused in half-slumber as she lay practically submerged in the large bathtub. Even in this semi-conscious state she still heard his car rumble up the drive and into the garage. 

The candles she had placed around the rim of the tub had long since extinguished but she didn't mind in the slightest, the light of the night sky being more then enough for her. All she wanted to do anyway was lie in the warm embrace of the water and let all her worries be soaked away. Sometimes it worked too…for a while at least. 

Scott, Scott, Scott. 

She stretched happily in the water at the thought of her team leader, a little happy sigh escaping her as she did so. She smiled dreamily knowing just how mortified he'd be if he knew he were such a hot topic these past few days or how embarrassed he'd be if he knew how many naughty thoughts he inspired in her and others, no matter how much they denied it. What made it worse she figured was the fact that he was totally oblivious, didn't even know the power he wielded over those around him. At least if he knew then she'd have something to hold against him but he couldn't even manage that properly. 

You joined the X-Men for him. 

It was something she had trouble even admitting to herself but it was the truth nonetheless. Even when she had gone over to the Brotherhood he had been civil towards her when the rest of them had blanked her. As always he had tried to make a difficult situation tolerable and had stoically taken her accusations and insults anyway because that was just the way he was. 

Joined just for him. 

When she learned the truth of Mystique's treachery, it had been an easy choice to join Xavier's brigade but the strange thing was she had been considering about it anyway, the brotherhood's lack of cohesion troubling her whereas the Scott and his teammates resembled a family as much as anything else. 

He'll never see you as more then a friend. 

There was the heart of the matter but here in the safety of the water she could dream. Her head slid beneath the waters surface as she ignored painful reality. 

========================== 

  
  


He hadn't intended to go this far this early but he would have been a fool to turn down an opportunity like this. His position secure he carefully fed the thin cable about an inch into the window. Bathed in the green from his night vision goggles, he could see that the room appeared empty, a bathroom of some sort. He twisted the cable slowly and the view moved slowly around the room…no it was empty all right. 

He retracted the cable and placed it back in its place in his bandoleer. Whoever thought that thieves got in and out of buildings using a helpful girl's hair pin and a credit card were sorely mistaken; it was all high tech now. He examined the window carefully for any potential sensors and satisfied when he found none carefully grasped with both hands. Checking his stance once more, he lifted the window slowly, pushing it up another foot or so and then he waited for some sigh of an alarm going off. 

Satisfied that he was still undetected he slid in through the gap, contorting to fit in through the narrow space. Landing on his hands he rolled to his feet in one quick but silent motion. There was an unusual smell in the air, incense or something. He touched one of the floor tiles with a finger and felt moisture. Someone had been in here recently. 

The sound of something breaking through water almost made him spring clean through the window but instinctively he held his breath and his position. There was an intake of breath and then a long contented sigh from his right where the tub was. For what seemed like an eternity he stayed motionless until finally he dared move again. He rose to full height, his eyes watching the tub intently through the night-sight. 

With practiced ease he edge closer to the tub until finally he saw her. Even through the green tint of the goggles he wore, she was radiant. Her wet hair was matted to her face, two strange white streaks showing up readily in his altered vision. Due to an abundance of foam, her dignity was kept largely intact but he saw enough to make him lick his lips. 

He should have left right there and then, either to continue towards the goal or to get the hell out of here but he couldn't tear himself away from the bathing beauty. Having made the wrong decisions all night he decided to carry out in that vein and slowly pushed his goggles up, revealing black on red eyes. A fingerless glove stretched forward until it hung shaking over the side of her face. 

_"You'll blow everything Remy,"_ a voice that sounded strangely like his papa warned him, "_just for some mermaid in a bath._" 

What did papa know? 

His index finger hardly brushed her face when he jumped back like he had been punched in the gut, all the breath stolen from him. A frantic Rogue, who had been shaken from bliss by an assault of memories and images that were not her own sprang to her feet and in a moment that would make her cringe everytime someone brought it up, she screamed with the all the vigor of a B-Movie queen. 

========================== 

  
  


Evan and Scott, who had been talking down in the garage were nearest when Rogue screamed. 

Evan was already starting to move, "That sounded like…" 

"Rogue," Scott finished as he sprang towards the stairs. "Get the others," he ordered as they hit the landing of the first floor. Evan complied immediately and tore off down the hall as Scott continued upwards unerringly. 

The part of him that wasn't urging his legs to move faster sorted through tactical data; Friday night meant Rogue would be in the bathroom, the door would be locked from the inside meaning Kurt or Kitty would have to go in, Kitty would be better as who knows what condition Rogue would be in. Still, Rogue never screamed, no matter what the danger. This was serious. All on its own, one of his hands had snaked up to hold his glasses. 

========================== 

  
  


"Calm down, chere," a still rather stunned Remy pleaded in gasps, reaching out towards her while trying to figure out what the hell he had just happened. The jumping up and screaming he understood but the fact that he felt like he had been hit by a bulldozer, he did not. 

Rogue stood dripping in the bath, some part of her remembering that she was naked and doing the best to retain some modesty but another part told her that someone had tried something they really shouldn't have and to be ready for anything. The two of them had been like that for a few moments when things got really surreal. 

"Rogue!" a voice called but she couldn't find her voice to answer. 

She was aware of someone trying the door before she heard the familiar whipcrack of one of Scott's optic blasts. The door sailed through the room before smashing against the far wall. 

Scott stepped in through the hole and took in the scene, light spilling in from the hallway behind him. There was a guy dressed completely in black wearing a lot of high tech gear reaching out towards a completely naked Rogue. It was possible that there was a rational explanation for this and that this commando would be only the one to supply it but frankly at that moment Scott wasn't interested. 

Rogue wouldn't scream unless threatened which was all he needed to know. 

Remy turned to face him just as Scott lifted his glasses and opened his eyes, the red energy gushing forth like this were its only chance to escape. If Remy thought getting hit by something akin to a bulldozer was the worst thing that could happen to him that night, then nothing could prepare him for when Scott's freight train like blast knocked him and a great deal of the wall behind him clean out of the building. 

Scott ran to the gaping hole he had created to the ground two stories below and was surprised to see the stranger stumbling into the darkness. His mind was already thinking of pursuit when a whimper from behind him dragged him back to more immediate concerns. 

He dashed over the remains of the door and grabbed a large towel. Without a word, he leapt into the bath and wrapped her up in it. Not knowing what else he could do, he held her until Evan arrived with Storm and Kitty who could only stare in shock at the carnage in the room. 

To be continued… 


	6. Sewers & Steam

All characters are the property of Marvel. 

===============================

  
  


"Goddammit," Pierce exclaimed as he stepped in something he dared not examine closely. 

At the best of times, Pierce hated it down here and now that he was the bearer of bad tidings, he disliked it all the more. Given that it was the sole tunnel to Essex's inner sanctum, it was rather fitting that it was as unnerving as the man himself. Pierce very much doubted that it was part of the original blueprints but rather something Essex had put in afterwards where there would be no official record of it and little chance of anyone knowing of its construction. 

The single door to the room was an ancient metal monstrosity with a wheel that you would turn not unlike the doors found in a ship or submarine. In fact the whole tunnel down to the lab gave off the feeling of being submerged, like being in a sewer or a waterworks. The walls had this persistent slime and even the air seemed a little off. Frankly the sooner he got this over with the better. 

He knocked firmly on the metal plating twice, the dull sound echoing about him seeming unnaturally loud to his ears. 

"Enter," a calm voice called through, as though he had been expected. 

Pierce spun the wheel and pushed the door inward with a little effort as rust had long since invaded the door hinges and made it increasingly less likely to cooperate. As he came through he once again felt he was stepping into a different world from the one he had just endured with the pristine white walls and tiled floor a complete opposite to the slick cobbled path he had just traveled. 

He caught a brief glimpse of Emma on an operating table, her upper body totally exposed though any chance of a cheap thrill was quickly spoiled by the sight of a number of organic tubes that were attached to her at various points, each of them pulsating sickeningly in a steady rhythm all of their own. They resembled bloated snakes eating into her then any medical equipment he had ever seen. Essex quickly covered her with a white sheet before turning his attention to Pierce who was particularly horrified to note that the man's entire forearms were covered in dull crimson of blood. 

"It looks like the thief ran into a spot of bother," Pierce announced though his voice faltered, betraying the unease he felt. 

"Oh?" was all Essex said in reply though it was clearly an invitation for Pierce to continue. 

"I drove him to the mansion like you instructed. He told me to wait for about an hour while he checked the place out and he just disappeared over the wall. About twenty minutes later, a corner of the mansion exploded and I think it's fair to say, it wasn't a scheduled occurrence." 

"Did you wait the hour?" Essex wondered aloud, tapping his chin with a finger that created a small stain of blood. 

"What?" Pierce asked in confusion, thrown by Essex's ignorance of what he was doing. 

"Did you wait for the hour that he instructed you to wait?" Essex responded in such a manner as to suggest to Pierce that he regarded him as being only two steps up from a worm. 

"Well I - No...no I didn't," he admitted. 

"It doesn't matter. What manner of explosion was it?" he asked curiously. 

"Well from where I was sitting, a portion of the west wall got blown out by a red beam," he described with as little enthusiasm as possible. 

"Well it seems that my thief, as you put it, ran into Mr. Summers," the mild irritation he felt at Remy's blatant failure overshadowed by evidence of Scott's prowess, "he truly is all that I hoped for." 

Pierce said nothing to this, his already immense dislike for Summers growing by the moment. 

"What's wrong with Frost?" he asked, hoping for a quick change of subject and because he actually was genuinely interested if not a little concerned. 

"There's nothing wrong with her at all...well nothing that we can't fix anyway," he joked with that rather chilling smile of his. "Now Donald, if you'd please excuse me, I've a depressing phone call to make to poor Remy's father." 

Donald, who was more then eager to leave said nothing and practically sprinted out of the room, pausing only to laboriously close the metal door behind him. It was only afterwards in the clammy cold of the corridor did he wonder if Essex even cared that he had blood dripping from his arms. 

===============================

  
  


While he never expected nor even remotely wanted to be treated like some sort of a hero for his actions the previous night, he really didn't expect to be given the silent treatment by just about everybody the following day. Evan was seemingly pissed because the wall Scott knocked out also took a big chunk out of the side of his room, meaning that he was forced to bunk with Kurt for the night which Scott could would entail little sleep as Kurt could be _very_ talkative. 

Jean who Scott noted had been acting weird for the past few days anyway just acted increasingly so while Kitty was putting up a show of solidarity with her roommate Rogue who seemed to be avoiding him like the plague and finally the Professor was apparently disappointed in his shoot first - ask questions later response to the intruder. He hadn't said anything but Scott knew the _disappointed_ face a mile away. 

So it was just him and Hank alone in the kitchen helping themselves to breakfast the following morning as everyone else avoided him. Hank was too good-natured and understanding to ever willingly alienate someone. 

So how's the patient?" Scott asked between mouthfuls of warm coffee. 

"Still unconscious naturally but no longer in harm's way," Hank replied cheerfully, having always gained pleasure from performing his medical duties. 

After the others had arrived in the bathroom the previous night and someone more _capable_ was there to comfort Rogue, Scott had gone down to the grounds to try and track the intruder. It didn't prove very difficult as they found him in an untidy heap by the western wall; his strength having given out before he could scale it. Between them, Bobby and Scott carried him down to the infirmary where Hank immediately went to work, unconcerned about his identity or what he had done. The Hippocratic oath didn't see good or bad, just an individual in distress. 

"The Professor's pissed," Scott noted, hoping for a sympathetic ear in Hank. 

"Well, he can be just a bit _too much_ of an idealist from time to time," Hank replied diplomatically, "I'm sure you made the right decision at the time." 

So how come I'm been given the outcast treatment," Scott wondered aloud, his voice betraying a little of the bitterness he felt. 

"People are feeling vulnerable at the moment," Hank surmised. "An apparent attack on a defenseless girl taking a bath of all things, just reminds everyone that even in our most personal and private moments in this most secure of buildings, we are not safe from intrusion. You're not being given the silent treatment Scott, you've just dealt with it a lot faster then everyone else." 

Scott scratched the back of his head. All of that sounded great but he didn't necessarily believe any of it to be true. He shrugged his shoulders and began buttering a slice of toast, at a loss for what else he could do other then wait for everyone else to deal with it too. 

===============================

  
  


"It's as you suspected Professor, he's X-Gene positive," Hank informed the rest of the adults a while later in the Professor's study as he stared out the window, watching the rain from the light shower that had threatened all morning. It seemed to match the mood of the place right now. 

"His name is Remy LeBeau," the Professor responded unsurprised by Hank's revelation. "I ran his details through a number of law enforcement databases and got a positive match. It's filled with mostly juvenile crime, nothing too serious," he told them, throwing a paper folder onto his desk. 

"So what's he doing sneaking around here with all this gear?" Logan asked as he went through the equipment that was laid out on a small portable tray. "Some of this is military grade equipment and some of it seems even more advanced then that...certainly ain't cheap." 

"And who is he working for? No one would burgle a boarding house for teenagers and expect to make anything from it," Ororo added from her seat on the couch. 

"These are all questions that only he can answer. I do not wish to enter his mind while he's recovering. Such psychic landscapes can be...disorientating," the Professor mused. 

"We may have another issue to deal with too," Hank broached a topic that had been troubling him since his breakfast encounter with Scott. 

"With LeBeau?" Ororo asked. 

"No, with the students." 

"How so?" Xavier asked. 

"We have been so busy dealing with Mr. LeBeau that the students have been left rather rudderless. This episode has fragmented the older ones and the younger students are listless through sheer empathy." 

"The doc's right," Logan nodded, "they all seem kind of lost at the moment." 

The Professor considered this for a moment and could think of only one action to take. 

"Well then this is what we shall do," he gestured at Ororo and Logan. "You two split the students between you and take them off somewhere for the day. Do something to take their minds off of things, something fun. Hank and I will remain behind to tend to our mysterious guest." 

Logan was about to say something when the Professor interrupted him. 

"And no Logan, the Danger Room does not count as fun." 

They all smiled at Logan's half-hearted grimace before leaving to round up the errant students. 

===============================

  
  


"Now this is heaven," Amara moaned through the fog of steam that filled the small wooden room. 

"Where did you find this place?" Kitty murmured as talking properly just seemed like too much effort right now. In fact just keeping her eyes open seemed like too much effort right about now. 

Ororo who was well used to the steam's effects smiled at her charges lethargy; nothing cleansed the mind and spirit like a day spent lounging in a sauna where helpful attendants waited on your every whim. Much like Rogue's Friday night bath ritual, this place was the little corner where she could escape from all the pressures and tensions of the mansion and life in general. 

"As last night's normally laid back atmosphere had been so rudely interrupted, I decided that in order to restore the natural balance of things, us girls needed some proper and professional pampering." 

As the girls murmured their approval, she poured some more water onto the red-hot coals. An almost palpable wall of steam bellowed out as the water hissed on contact with the glowing rocks. Normally she would lock the door, discard her towel and sweat until her soul was as clean as her skin but today she kept the towel on for the sake of the rest of the girls who might not be as comfortable with their bodies as she was with hers. 

She turned towards Rogue, who this trip was very much for. Anyone who knew the girl would readily acknowledge that she was a fighter so it was unsettling to Ororo to find her now so unwilling to talk about what had occurred to her the previous night. However she knew better then to force the issue with her so instead she decided that therapy should begin in that tried and tested of arenas; boy talk. 

"How was the film last night, Kitty?" she asked, her voice betraying the barest hint of amusement. 

Six pairs of interested eyes turned to face young Miss Pryde, who had turned a rather endearing shade of red. 

"Oh it was alright," she replied, her voice unnaturally high pitched much to everyone's amusement. 

"Only alright?" Ororo teased. 

"Judging from the smile on her face when she came back, it was a lot more then alright," Jubilee giggled. 

"Though I had some misgivings about him, Mr. Alvers is turning out to be quite the gentleman, and so handsome. It appears that he's quite the catch, Kitty," Ororo mused out loud causing Kitty to blush even further before she continued, "I must confess I thought originally that you and Kurt were going to end up together given the way he was chasing you." 

"Kurt?" Kitty exclaimed loudly while some of the others laughed at this, it being a common misconception at the time. 

"What's wrong with him?" Ororo asked innocently, pleased at how easy it was to get the ball rolling. 

"There's nothing wrong with him," she stated like it was the most obvious thing in the world, "it's just...it would be like going out with your brother or your cousin. He's Kurt, ya know?" 

"It would be like going out with Jaime," Rahne echoed, "except it would be a whole family instead of just a cousin." It sounded to Ororo that the young shape shifter doth protest too much but she said nothing. 

"Plus he's about twelve," Jubilee added, which made them all laugh. 

"Anyway Kurt wouldn't give us the time of day because he is so very happy with Amanda," Kitty stated to a general consensus. 

"Is it that serious?" Ororo asked, intrigued, as Kurt was uncharacteristically shy when it came to talking about Amanda. 

"I think it is. If you ask me, I think she's really into him," Jubilee contributed. 

"Has he said anything to you about it Rogue?" Ororo asked. It was a pretty clumsy attempt at getting her involved but she couldn't very well ask her about what romantic entanglements she was involved in. 

Rogue took a while to answer, aware that everyone was watching her carefully in case she might break. Not for the first time, they totally misread her silence. 

"Jubilee's right. He's taking it slow because he really likes her and he's smart enough to see that she really likes him. It's just a shame more boys weren't like that," the ire in her voice clearly audible. 

"You don't think all of them are like that, surely?" Ororo wasn't sure of her footing as she proceeded along this line of conversation. She realized she was foolish to expect Rogue to be full of self-pity. No Rogue always bypassed pity and went straight for anger. 

Rogue sat up on the bench so she could see Ororo properly and to give her a moment to get her thoughts in order. "Ah think that unless they've been hit with a mallet, guys are blind to what's going on around them. Look at Kurt. Amanda had to go up to him and say "Kurt, I really like you" before anything happened but now that he knows, he's totally into her too." 

"Is Rogue right, are males simply ignorant or is she being harsh?" 

"Men are designed to hunt," Jean answered slowly, "so doing the chasing comes easily to them but when it's a girl whose doing all the work, Rogue's right. Guys are oblivious." 

"So speaking of oblivious men, how are you and Duncan getting along these days, Jean? I expect it won't be long until there's talk of a rather large anniversary," Ororo half joked. 

Jean, who had been largely silent for the majority of the conversation thus far pursed her lips slightly as she considered Ororo's remark. She and Duncan had just recently had a heated discussion concerning said anniversary and it had been anything but a laughing matter. In spite of herself, she started talking out loud, the heat of the room and the overwhelming aura of relaxation loosening her tongue far more then she would normally allow. 

"I wish the whole anniversary thing was a joke, I really do but he's kind of taken it to heart. He wants to move the relationship on," she parroted in a distinctly un-Duncan like voice though the sentiment was certainly his. 

"How far does he want to go?" Kitty asked. 

Jean hesitated before answering in a rather flippant though truthful manner, "All the way." 

It was the kind of statement that silenced a room and for a moment, a pin dropping would have drowned out all other noise in the sauna. 

"You and Duncan haven't done it yet?" Kitty finally asked, almost embarrassed to be the first to speak after such a revelation. It almost sounded like an accusation rather then the statement that Kitty intended. Jean was the big sister that she never had and to Kitty appeared to possess a wisdom that Kitty aspired to have as well. 

"It's not that he hasn't wanted to before...it's just...I," Jean searched in vain for the right words to convey what she meant. 

"It would make it real," Rogue practically whispered from her corner. 

"What?" Jean asked, slightly thrown by the remark. 

Rogue looked at Jean evenly. Whatever the others may have felt or even believed, she knew that Jean would never do anything serious with Duncan even if the redhead didn't know it herself. There were other factors at play here. 

"It's all been fun and games with Duncan but the minute you two start fumblin' around in the back of his daddy's car, you've made your choice and it becomes something else, something official and bigger then you. Ah don't think you ever thought about committing to Duncan; he was just a simple but popular boy who caught your eye. You could dump him at a moment's notice and there'd be someone waiting to take up the slack. Someone you could string along all this time with no risk of ever losing him." 

Had Jean been thinking straight she might have reasoned that Rogue was being offensive due to what happened back at the mansion and that she wasn't really attacking her at all. She would have let the remark pass and taken the moral high ground by not responding in anger but by saying something conciliatory to smooth over what she said. 

However a more base part of her reasoned that Rogue and she had been careening towards this confrontation from the moment she joined and that recent events had only helped to push the schedule forward. Well if she wanted to do this now, then it was fine by her. All pretense of the Taryn Convention went out the door. 

"Just who the hell do you think you are?" Jean roared, the temperature in the room going up several notches. 

"Girls," Ororo interjected but by now it was far too late for that. 

"Ah'm the one who gets to see all the damage done every time Hurricane Jean comes through the mansion telling him what a wonderful time she'll have out with Duncan. Ah'm the one who gets to pick up the pieces and put him back together again." Rogue replied, not backing down in the slightest. "You beat him down and then when he might just get free of your spell, you reel him back in, make him feel like his valuable to you again. Some of us wouldn't ever let him forget that he's important." 

Rogue's aim was sure and true, her words filled with a year's worth of venom to which Jean had little answer. 

"He's not stupid Rogue; if you or Taryn or anyone else for that matter wanted him bad enough, you could make it happen." 

"No one can make anything happen with you still in the picture," Rogue replied with an _Oh Please_ expression. "Taryn practically kidnapped him and he still wasn't anything other then friendly towards her." 

"That's different, he has to hide what he is from Taryn and he could never really be himself-" 

"still you still fumed every time she put her hand on his arm or what about that time she asked him to the dance? Ah say the look on your face." 

"And I saw the look on yours. You know what your problem is Rogue? You're afraid, plain and simple." 

"What? Afraid of you?" 

"No, afraid of him. You're just using me and anything else convenient as an excuse. I think you're afraid of what he'd say if you told him what you really felt, a little afraid in case he'd say no but you're really afraid in case he'd say yes. You're just not able to deal with that so you've given yourself a million reasons why it wouldn't work. If it wasn't me then it would be your power holding you back or if not then something else." 

"There's only one reason that counts and that's you stringing him along," Rogue answer defiantly. 

"You really think I'm stringing him along, do you?" Jean asked, her voice getting increasingly lower as she regained her composure. She realized she couldn't fight back without saying things that would hurt Rogue deeply, whether they were true or not and though they were on opposite sides here, this wasn't worth decimating the last shreds of companionship they had. 

Rogue laughed mockingly, "Do you really believe you're not?" 

There it was; the $64,000 question. 

She knew the answer. Hated herself for knowing it all along but what choice did she have 

She attempted to explain, everyone else seemed to fade away leaving just her and Rogue alone in the room. 

"Don't you think I know the way he looks at me sometimes, the things he does for me without being asked. There are occasions when I know where he is or what he's doing without even trying and that frightens me. To be the focus of all that intensity, it's just too much to handle. But funnily at the same time it makes you feel special. He can look at you and make you feel like you're his whole world and that's a lot of responsibility to bear." 

"Ah know that look," Rogue replied, her voice now calm as well. It wasn't some idle boost on her part either. She would happily bet her life on the fact that the things he confided in her were something that he had told no one else not even Jean. It somehow made her special. 

"Then you know how terrible it would be to lose that but also how scary it would be to finally embrace it totally. It's selfish I know to keep the distance but wouldn't you do the same until you knew you could measure up to that responsibility." 

"It's not fair on him though, he's never sure where he stands," Rogue retorted. 

"Because I can't...I can't...," she just stopped, her mind stuck in a recurring loop. "Do you think you could you make him happy? As happy as he deserves to be?" she finally asked. It was something she wondered about herself. Of all the people in the mansion, she believed he was the one most deserving of genuine happiness. He gave so much of himself and never asked for anything in return; despite the cards life had dealt him. 

"Ah don't know." She didn't. "Always knew Ah never had a chance so never really gave much time to thinking about what Ah'd do if Ah did." 

"I'm not sure either," Jean mused, "Wouldn't it be terrible to be a disappointment to him. To not live up to those expectations." 

Rogue said nothing but for a moment she hated Jean for her doubt and her self-pity. She never knew how easily everything came to her; or how he would never be disappointed in anything she did or said. She could smile at him while walking up the aisle with Duncan and somewhere he'd still hold on to the glimmer of a chance with Jean Grey. 

"You don't have to worry about that," she whispered, "and anyway, maybe someone will come in and sweep him out from under us." 

"It won't be Taryn," Kitty's voice quietly interjected, the two of them having forgotten there was anyone else even in the room. 

"Sorry?" Jean asked, a little startled to hear someone else's voice other then herself or Rogue. 

"Taryn and Scott are officially history...though come to think of I don't know if they were ever like...current," Kitty stated, suddenly a little nervous at being the center of attention. 

"What happened?" Jean asked, having not heard this gossip for some reason. 

"Well rumor has it that Scott caught her badmouthing him yesterday at lunch," Kitty filled in quickly, not mentioning any badmouthing of Jean for diplomatic reasons. "He left in a hurry, then she left in a hurry so I think it's safe to say that's over." 

Jean sat back, soaking up this latest piece in the puzzle when Kitty started to talking again to fill the uncomfortable silence. 

"Now there's just Library Girl left in the race," she added helpfully. 

Kitty wasn't sure whether this was right time to say that or not but it slipped out anyway. As Rogue's roommate and Jean's surrogate sister, she felt a little caught in the middle and wasn't one hundred percent sure where her loyalties should lie. She knew how Rogue felt about Scott having caught her furtive glances on a number of occasions and she saw how jealous Jean could get of anyone showing an interest in him so her feelings were pretty evident too. 

"Whose Library Girl?" Jean asked, her face screwing up in confusion. 

"The girl he rescued, remember?" Rogue reminded her. 

"That wasn't a once off?" she asked. 

"Taryn was talking to her when Scott caught her stabbing him in the back. Whose to say she wasn't prompted," Rogue wondered aloud. 

"She did seem awful keen and a little too nice," Kitty agreed immediately. 

Rogue simply nodded in agreement before leaning back against the wall, suddenly tried of the discussion. Her action seemed to signal the end of conversation in general and Ororo was left sitting there wondering if all of this had been a good idea in the first place. Well at least Rogue was acting like her old self again even if a few home truths had been revealed in the process. Young love was a funny thing, she thought with a smile. 

===============================

  
  


"The boys still aren't back," Kitty announced as she entered her shared room. 

Rogue simply murmured something and continued to read some tattered novel she had been stuck into for the past few days. She was always reading something or another, Kitty had observed so as usual, she continued the rather one sided conversation. 

"I can't imagine where Mr. Logan has taken them for fun. Won't be a sauna that's for sure. Maybe a bar, or a strip club. That would be funny. I can just picture Kurt's face and Sam, he won't know where to look." 

"Ah huh," came the automatic uninterested response. 

"So you and Jean finally got it out in the open?" Kitty asked as she carefully hung a clean top of hers. She heard the book close and a slight sigh. 

"It was always out in the open, we just never talked about it is all," Rogue responded thoughtfully. 

"Scott's clueless, you know? He needs the mallet to the head." Kitty advised as she took a seat at the side of her own bed so she was facing Rogue. 

"You know what's funny Kitty, last night two guys saw me naked; not a stitch on me. One of them is lying in a coma down in the infirmary and-" 

"He got what he deserved," Kitty interrupted. "Anyone who would try to do what he did deserves a coma and more." 

"Maybe...Ah don't know. But Scott knew just what to do. Ah don't think he even noticed Ah had no clothes on, he just went ahead and held me anyway, not saying a word. Ah never felt safer." 

Kitty smiled sadly at her friend's wistful look. There was a situation she would never get in the middle of. 

"Ah got him swimming around up here now," Rogue indicated to her head. 

"Who? Scott?" Kitty asked wondering for a moment why he too was not down with Mr. McCoy." 

"No the thief. Got flashes of memories that aren't mine," she said with tested resolve. 

"Like what?" Kitty asked. 

"They're strange and kind of mixed up, like remembering a dream. Ah can picture someone smiling, but the smile looks more like a shark, all sharp teeth. There's a smell like Logan's cigars, only softer and there's a moment of pain, right here," she indicated her cheek, "associated with a flash of white or yellow maybe. Ah don't know, there's just so much going on up there now." 

"What's it like?" Kitty asked, leaning forward. 

"It's fine but there's a voice like yours going "dance, dance" all the time," Rogue replied with a smile. 

"Oh shut up, you were never so cool in your life," Kitty taunted. 

They both turned at the low rumble of Scott's car and the X-Van coming from somewhere in the distance. 

"Look's like the boys are back," Rogue murmured. 

To be continued... 


End file.
